On Death and Dying
by IntoTheSkyUntil
Summary: Series of one shots, each stylistically different, studying the seven stages of grief after the Fall. Although they don't always realize it, both Sherlock and John's lives continue to intertwine in unexpected ways. 2/19-Letters to the British Government
1. The Shock Diary of Dr John Watson

**Many thanks to my beta, thyla23! This is also posted at A03 now since I can't really update it at school with my ipad (for some reason FF.N doesn't really work on my ipad-strange!) Anyway, updates on this site will be slower but since I started it here, I figured I should update it here as well! :)**

**Also I went with the ACD canon date for Reichenbach, May 4th. These need to be dated to work.**

**Loosely inspired by the stylistic genius of David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas**

* * *

_Truth has many appeals, not the least which is the power to shock. –Jules Renard_

* * *

_May 4th/May 5th 2011-_

Medical treatment regarding his concussion had been declined time and time again. (He was fine, he was absolutely fine.) His phone had been shut off after he had received a barrage of texts and missed calls-Harry, Mrs. Hudson, Molly-Harry again-Harry again-Harry again-

And now he was at a hospital.

Regarding his profession, irony was evident in the fact that, at least to some extent, Dr. John Hamish Watson had always hated hospitals.

He didn't hate working at hospitals, per se, no, the work was fine. Just fine. But for some reason, Dr. John Watson hated being at the hospital outside of work. Why? John could expound upon the subject for hours (and he had in the past, much to Sherlock's inadvertent chagrin). The fluorescence was always too bright, the machines were too loud, it always smelled of antiseptic-too much antiseptic and death (for some reason John could always smell death. Funny thing Afghanistan does to a man.) Invariably, the army doctor also believed that there were always too many people yelling-or crying? John couldn't even tell anymore. It was always loud and yet so muted, and still so damned loud. And bright.

Similar to where he was now, actually. Yes, he was at a hospital.

Despite John's love of medicine which ostensibly drove him to be a doctor, at the core, he had always hated hospitals. And so he had left hospitals forever (or so he had thought at the time), gone into the field as an army doctor, and yet here he was, back at a hospital, again. Doing something. Somewhere in a hospital. Either way you looked at it, according to Dr. John Hamish Watson, it was too wrong.

All of it, so wrong.

John squinted slightly as a figure shadowed his view of the egregious fluorescence that permeated the waiting area of the emergency room at St. Bartholomew's Hospital. Someone was blocking the light, standing directly in front of him.

John felt himself blink.

And now the figure appeared to be speaking.

"Dr. Watson?"

Out of the corner of his eye, John could vaguely see a shape who he recognized as Detective Inspector Lestrade wave off the form of an emergency room doctor currently standing in front of him. John watched the shadow slowly retreat from his vision and the fluorescence blinded him once more. It was in that motion that John finally came somewhat to his senses as to exactly what portion of the hospital he currently was occupying.

Waiting room.

He had already known that somehow.

He was in a hospital waiting room. How odd, normally he was on the other side of things. John opened his senses a little more. Surgical emergency waiting room most likely, judging by what he could sense was a telly perched high in the corner and the presence of the less-than-popular six month old magazines that had been thumbed through time and time again.

Waiting room, yes.

But yet something was not quite right. This waiting room was inordinately quiet for the quantity of trauma that normally occurred in London. In fact, John realized, still unmoving, that there were only two people currently occupying the room: himself and Lestrade. Waiting room. Maybe? Why? The two of them were seated on a couch-was it a couch? Or chairs. John spread his left hand open to feel the material. Couch or chair, he couldn't tell but it was something soft and yet scratchy in the typical impersonal hospital way. Say what you would about the social benefits of public healthcare but hospitals were always so bloody impersonal.

"John?"

That would be Lestrade.

At the sound of Lestrade's voice, still unmoving, John focused away from the fluorescence and straight ahead out of the entrance of the waiting room at the hospital walkway. He watched the endless supply of doctors, nurses, patients, and visitors stream by (all too sterile and too white). So many people and yet they were the only two people in the waiting room. How strange...

Sod it, John hated hospitals. He preferred field work infinitely better.

"John?" John sensed Lestrade's voice was quieter than before

"Been three hours since..."

The army doctor simply nodded in recognition (of what?) as the detective's voice trailed off. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Lestrade shake his head slightly, as if unable to reconcile his own...something.

Silence again.

The muted sounds of the hospital permeated the waiting room and John Watson's senses. The lady on the telly squawking about a rumour of someone who accidentally fell or something and someone crying and children screaming somewhere and beeping and pages of codes-

But why could John not hear them all properly?

"You're thinking about...what, John?" Lestrade's voice, far away, was uncharacteristically permissive.

What was he thinking about? He wasn't entirely sure, but there was a phrase, a phrase that he had once heard, and for some unknown reason his mind was repeating that phrase over and over and over again. John cleared his throat and nodded slightly, indicating that Lestrade's question wouldn't go unanswered.

"...an accomplice to human restlessness." John heard himself say.

Why did he say that?

"

What is?" Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a confused (and concerned-why was he so damned concerned?) expression cross Lestrade's face.

"The sea." John heard himself respond, still not making eye contact with the detective sitting next to him. Why were words so hard to form right now? "I heard it, once."

For some reason, John felt an inadvertent smile tug at the corner of his sense perception as he thought about that phrase. How did it go again? Something about how the sea had never been kind to man, it was at most an accomplice to human restlessness. Human restlessness. Oh, how he knew the ultimate impersonation of that phrase incredibly well.

"You have a concussion, you're still in shock-" Lestrade began quietly.

"I'm not." His automatic response sounded faster and slightly colder that he had intended. Why had he sounded like that? The army doctor vaguely heard Lestrade sigh next to him, but not in frustration, no.

In sadness?

Lestrade may have been sad for some reason, but John most certainly wasn't the one who had caused it. No matter what the detective was going through at the moment (had he ever even seen Lestrade sad before?), John himself was certainly feeling something too and had been for what he considered quite a while. Was he sad like Lestrade? No. Sadness was too superficial, too shallow to describe what he currently felt. In actuality, all the army doctor could compare his current state to was that of someone drowning. He felt like he was drowning again.

Drowning.

John had almost drowned in the sea once, when he was seven. People drown in the sea all the time in fact, and that was, most likely as he imagined, how he had remembered that quote about the sea from so long ago.

The sea.

The sea was ever changing, always dynamic, a tempest. The sea had claimed the lives of many men (his own almost included). Men on the sea-pirates (after all, hadn't Mycroft once said so long ago that Sherlock had always wanted to become a pirate?). The sea. _The Old Man and the Sea_-good book, if John remembered correctly-the sea-

The sea was same colour as his eyes.

Was...why did he want to say was? That's bloody stupid. Is.

The sea is the same colour as his eyes.

Tranquil aquiline, turbulent cerulean, or brooding cobalt depending on what exactly that brilliant beautiful mind was thinking at any particular moment; no matter the exact colour, his eyes always reminded John of the sea. Ever changing, always dynamic, a tempest.

Hah. A tempest!

When John was a boy of seven years old, his parents had taken him and Harry to the seaside near Sussex for summer holiday. He remembered the sand, the sun, the heat - it had been so bloody hot - and the lack of wind. The lack of wind, which had been less than indicative of the strong undertows beneath the serene lapping waves. While swimming in the sea, John, nothing more than a tiny blond haired boy at seven, had been drawn out into one such undertow amidst the screams from himself, his sister, and his parents. John remembered that discordant moment of churning relentless waves, the taste of salt water in his throat, eyes, and lungs as he struggled to keep his head above water until the lifeguard could reach him.

Please God, let me live, he had said.

(At seven, he never knew of the foreshadowing that phrase would carry.)

But John was seven and had fought to stay above the water that day despite the inevitable drowning he knew would come. He could hear that help was coming, but he had grown so tired and so weary from fighting the relentless surf. He remembered how he had taken one last deep breath before surrendering to the exhaustion and inevitable looming ocean that had surrounded him.

And then all John remembered was the darkness and silence as he was dragged down, down, down under the water.

But most of all, he remembered the pain.

Oh God, the pain. Inordinate pain. Neurons misfiring, synapses snapping, neuroreceptors miscalculating, all systems on overload as he began to die. He was drowning, oh he was drowning, just let it all end, just please let it all stop, and then-

Light, air, sun.

John remembered spitting out water, gasping for air, coughing. The sound of his parents crying. He was lying on the sand - he had felt the grains of sand between his fingers - a lifeguard standing over him, Harry at his side.

He had never gone in the ocean again after that day.

John Watson had almost drowned when he was only seven years old and it was the most intense pain that he had ever felt in his entire life. More than his parent's dying. More than Harry's self-destructive drinking. More than being shot in Afghanistan, by far. And oddly enough, that exact same inordinate and infinite pain he had felt when he was drowning was what he was feeling right now.

How strange.

John felt himself squint slightly at the thought. Or maybe it was just at those damn overly eager fluorescent lights again.

Why exactly was he feeling this way?

Sherlock would inevitably be amused that John couldn't figure out what had brought about these memories ("Dear God, what's it like in your funny little brains? It must be so boring", Sherlock had once said). In fact, after John told him about the drowning sensation he was currently feeling (once he got home from whatever he was doing waiting at this damned hospital), Sherlock would probably laugh slightly sardonically, call John a bloody idiot (with an unconscious tone in his voice that could only be what Sherlock would begrudgingly liken to sentiment), and then pick up his violin again and play something like Debussy's _La Mer_just to spite the army doctor.

Again with the drowning sensation.

So strange.

Especially since, as far as he could tell, John Watson knew that he wasn't seven again and he certainly wasn't anywhere even close to the sea. He was in some bloody hospital in London (Barts, right?), in the waiting area for the emergency room with Detective Inspector Lestrade who was sitting next to him - no - who had left for a brief moment. John was alone. Not for long though, as after an inordinate amount of time, Lestrade had returned and was now trying to force a paper cup of coffee in John's hand, now talking to him again.

Why wouldn't they leave him alone? Why did he feel like he couldn't breathe? And why did his entire world hurt so damn much?

"John..." Lestrade was addressing him again, now touching him gently on the wrist as he pressed the uncomfortably hot cup of coffee into his hand "Five hours now."

"Since what?" John realized his voice was softer than he intended, his unconscious memory reconciling something that his conscious being could not.

For some reason, Lestrade couldn't continue with his sentence, simply sighing and shaking his head. John continued to look ahead, grasping the untouched cup of coffee. He could feel the paper cup slowly grow colder as the moments - or was it hours? - wore on. John didn't know how much time had passed (he didn't care for some reason), but after what he considered a while, he heard a muted text tone close by. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Lestrade check his mobile phone. The detective sighed, a half-hearted attempt to catch John's attention.

"Police car here and I need to take you home, John." Lestrade said as he gently eased the cup of cold coffee out of John's hands. "Press conference just starting. It's time."

Time for what?

"C'mon, John." John vaguely felt himself rise, despite the comfortably numb sensation of just staying put. The pain subsided somewhat when he was just sitting there and thinking of that damned quote about the sea and nothing else. But Lestrade couldn't allow that; the detective was steadying the army doctor on his feet now, a hand cupped around his elbow and guiding him toward the long hospital corridor.

What was happening? John felt his body moving, but was still relatively unconscious of doing so.

After all, he was drowning. Why did no one seem to realize this?

He walked next to Lestrade down the hospital corridor toward the now darkened exit doors of St. Bartholomew's. The change in the lighting, now intermittently fluorescent instead of blindingly fluorescent, triggered something in John's unconscious memory and he was suddenly overcome with the feeling like he had forgotten something important. Very important.

What had he forgotten?

He should text Sherlock and ask him. Yes. Sherlock would know.

And before Lestrade could stop him - and once Lestrade realized what he was actually doing the detective cried out in protest - John had reached into his jacket pocket, pulled out his mobile phone, and typed out a quick text to Sherlock. John subconsciously moved away from Lestrade's grasp as he sent the message.

_Forgetting something. Potentially important, any ideas? -JW_

Oh, and one more thing. John unconsciously smiled as he typed his next message.

_We'd better not be out of milk again, you bloody bastard. -JW_

"John..." The sound of Lestrade's voice drew John's attention away from the screen of his phone. Lestrade shut his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose, apparently frustrated and sad at the same time. The both had stopped walking and were standing in the hospital corridor now, people streaming all around them. Here was a nurse, he was a doctor, was that a patient? Lestrade was waving one hand in a defeated and exasperated motion "John...you just need to-"

One distinct muted soft beep in response.

What?

John had heard the distinctive and familiar tone of Sherlock's mobile phone. One muted soft beep. It was nearby? Was Sherlock waiting to emerge from around the bend of the sterile white corridor ahead, his glaucous eyes beaming, like some sort of demigod rising from the very depths of the ocean itself?

John smiled, proud of the metaphor. Sherlock had been rubbing off on him. He would have to blog about that tonight.

One more muted beep. The second text.

"Oh God, John." Lestrade exhaled.

That sound of Sherlock's phone. It was too close to be anywhere but...

...in his pocket?

What on earth was Sherlock's mobile phone doing in his pocket?

Before John realized exactly what he was doing, he was patting around his jacket before finding Sherlock's phone that had somehow gotten placed in the front right pocket. He pulled the object out, puzzled at how he had come into possession of it. Did Sherlock give it to him? John turned it over in his hand, palming the foreign object as if he had never seen anything quite like it before.

How strange.

Why would he have Sherlock's phone?

The question brought about a sudden and intense sensation of drowning, now more forcefully than ever before.

The world spun, John shut his eyes and struggled to breathe.

Oh God, just make it stop.

"No-" John could feel as Lestrade gently closed his hand around Sherlock's phone. "I'll just - here - give it to me-"

But for some reason, John felt himself unable to let go. One more request for a dying man, eh? Let him keep the phone.

"Give it, John...c'mon..."

John opened his eyes as Lestrade finally eased Sherlock's phone out of his hand and slid it back into the army doctor's jacket pocket.

"Just keep it...there." Lestrade tapped John's jacket pocket gently, emphasizing that last word. "For now, okay? Just for now."

John felt himself nod. Right. Keep Sherlock's phone there. Follow Lestrade who had turned and continued walking toward the hospital exit.

Next orders, sir.

"I need you to hurry once we're out there, John. Sally has them distracted with a press conference, but if they see you it won't be for long, okay?"

John nodded again.

Just doing my job, sir.

The two men exited the hospital through the sliding doors (the doors were smaller than he had remembered them being before) and John took a moment to catch a glimpse of the now dusky sky. Night was well on it's way. Or was it already there? It was so hard to tell. And had it been raining earlier? It smelled slightly like rain, yet the pavement was now dry. While pondering the weather, John inadvertently turned toward the left, he heard some sort commotion over there - but Lestrade was right beside him and instantaneously dragging him in a different direction.

"Ah - no you don't." Lestrade forcefully (a little too forcefully) steered John to the right. The army doctor could see a single police car waiting at the curb. "C'mon, over here."

Why did he want to go left?

Far left, actually quite far to the left (had they exited out of a secret side door or something?), the army doctor had seen...something. John only had a brief glimpse as he exited the building but he had seen a massive crowd of people gathered around...something. Police lines, news reporters, a team of people, dressed in yellow and blue checked uniforms, and remnants of dust over something on the ground. John's brain registered the colours he had seen from afar only after he and Lestrade had taken several steps in the opposite direction.

The residue of grey powder covering a large stain of crimson. Oxygenated hemoglobin.

Oh. So that's what all of the fuss was about.

Clearly, they were cleaning up blood. Or in actuality, blood had been cleaned up and now there were people standing around it. It always astounded John exactly how much blood the human body could hold-

And oh, the drowning, the pain. Why the pain again?

That damned human unconscious. He had been fine for a few seconds after the phone incident, feeling like he was paddling above water again, but now? Now the tide had dragged him down and he was drowning, struggling. The darkness, the inordinate pain, the gasping for air and no air would come-

John felt himself stumble; Lestrade reached out and encircled the army doctor, saving him from crashing down to the pavement. The detective slid one arm around his back and grasped his side for support; the other hand cupping his elbow again in almost, what John would consider, a hug from behind (John knew Sherlock would laugh once he told him about this; he would laugh before his eyes would narrow ever so slightly in what John could only describe as unconscious jealously.) John gratefully eased his weight into Lestrade's grasp and he felt his head loll slightly back into Lestrade's shoulder. He focused on breathing. Walking seemed so difficult, so impossible, but as John knew, nothing was impossible with Sherlock-

No, Lestrade.

Lestrade was by his side, not Sherlock.

"C'mon John, you can make it."

No he couldn't, he was clearly dying. Lestrade was a bloody unobservant idiot. John couldn't walk, couldn't breathe, couldn't think.

"Car, John." Lestrade guided him gently to the open and waiting back door of a police car. He helped him slide into the back seat as John shut his eyes, struggling to breathe. The army doctor heard the door close and reached up to rub his face which was - wet? Very wet in fact. Wait, had he been crying? For how long? Exactly how long had he been crying?

Lestrade silently slid in the back seat next to him as John numbly wiped the tears away. The detective let out a tense sigh of relief.

"Well, we avoided that one, right? The press is all here right now, they'll be distracted for a while. You should be safe at home."

Home, ah yes.

221B Baker street, please.

That thought allowed him to surface from the pain, at least momentarily. John felt the car start and as he sat in the back seat of the police cab, his perpetual drowning momentarily subsided. However, despite the feeling of having his head above water again, he was unable to tell if anymore tears came during that silent ride back to 221B Baker Street.

He was just so bloody numb, wasn't he?

After an inordinate of time (and why did these dammed things always take so long? All the bureaucratic following of speed limits, how boring) the car finally pulled to a stop outside their flat. Lestrade made a rather hasty motion to get up.

And...oh.

It was the hastiness of that motion that finally drew John's full attention, everything else Lestrade had done had been so uncharacteristically quiet. It was the hastiness of that motion that caused John to finally turn his head and look at Lestrade - really look at him - for the first time.

Oh my God, what had happened to him? Was he drowning too?

The detective looked comparable with the army doctor, like he had just been recalled to life himself. Lestrade's eyes were red-rimmed (Sherlock would flippantly deduce that he had been crying but clearly anyone with half a brain could see that). Lestrade looked, what John could only describe, innumerably miserable. Haunted. Apologetic. But overall, John Watson swore that Lestrade looked at least 10 years older than he had when he last saw him which was - wait -when was that ?

For some strange reason, John couldn't remember.

"I'm fine, Lestrade." John heard himself say "Really. I'm fine."

"I don't think you're fine."

"Really, I am."

"John, think this through. I really don't think you should be alone-"

"No."

"John, there are a million reasons why you shouldn't be alone toni-"

"I'm fine."

"Seriously-"

"No, and that's final." His voice sounded inhumanly cold. That tone wasn't Dr. John Hamish Watson, nor simply John (his John). His tone was that of Captain John Watson, lethal soldier and army doctor in Afghanistan. That was the tone of voice that had gave orders and made people give in. And Lestrade did what all those before him who had heard that tone had done; he gave in.

"Go on then." Resigned, the detective shook his head, looking as though he had aged another lifetime. He looked too tired to fight on tonight.

Yes, sir.

John nodded to Lestrade as he slid out of the police cab, standing up in the cool night air. He heard the idling engine beside him and turned to look back at the detective still sitting in the back seat. Lestrade wearily leaned over.

"John just...call me if you need anything, okay? Anything at all. Check on you first thing in the morning."

John nodded once more, shut the back door of the car, and watched as it drove away down the deserted street. He felt fine. Right. Fine. Actually it was like he was paddling in the ocean again, head above water. But he wasn't in the ocean, he was in the middle of London and it was late at night.

221B, right.

Without consciously knowing what he was doing, John found himself turning the key to their flat and opening the door and walking up the stairs (quietly as Mrs. Hudson should be asleep at this hour) and then back home inside 221B Baker Street. He stepped inside the living room and looked around.

The silence was...astounding.

John took a moment to marvel at the sheer unfathomable emptiness of the flat. It was so bloody quiet. It was never this quiet. Had it ever been this quiet in 221B before?

No, it hadn't.

The feeling of drowning threatened to surge up again, but something inside John pushed it down as he kicked off his shoes and shrugged off his jacket in the middle of the living room. His jacket fell to the floor with a dull thud (probably his mobile phone) which drew John's attention downward. It was only then that he took notice of the blood stains all over his clothes. His arms, his shirt sleeves, his shirt itself, all covered in sanguine stains that seemed to blossom and grow whenever he moved.

Well, time to get rid of this shirt.

Sherlock would be glad ("I always prefer you in darker colours" Sherlock had once remarked, which gave John a funny feeling in his chest, now that he remembered those very deliberate words.)

But where was Sherlock? And would those eyes appear more cobalt or cyan tonight? Azure or a calm sea green? He had half expected that brilliant man to be pacing around their living room when John arrived home. Get ready John! The game is on John! Guess what I've discovered John - oh you'll never guess, so I might as well just tell you, John. As Sherlock rarely slept (but when he did, he sometimes distractingly slept without clothing on) John figured that he would enter to the former boiling eyeballs in the kitchen, micropipetting some sort of toxic chemical while sitting in his usual chair, or simply standing by the window and playing something dramatic on the violin like _Danse Macabre_.

John squinted at the thought. That was bloody stupid. Why would he be playing _Danse Macabre_? Sherlock always claimed that he hated Saint-Saens' melodramatic composures (and yet, John didn't know the scope of music very well, but he often believed that he heard Sherlock play Saint-Saens quite frequently). However, instead of his ever-so-fascinating flatmate greeting him tonight, all there was in 221B Baker street was silence and Dr. John Watson didn't know what to make of it.

It was just so damned quiet.

He was still standing in the living room, jacket and shoes in a pile in front of him. John looked over at the clock. 2:43am. Sod it. Late. It was late and he was sensible and he needed to get to bed. He walked methodically up the stairs and into his room.

Soldier on.

That was the next thing to do, right? After all, he was still wearing blood stained clothes, but stained by whose blood, God only knew.

John changed into his pyjamas (soft dark grey pants and a lighter grey t-shirt, his favourite) before reaching into the standard issue army medical kit that he kept hidden away in his bedside drawer. They had prescribed him sleeping pills once he came back from Afghanistan to help with the nightmares. The nightmares, oh. He had maybe taken the pills three times in his life, when things had gotten especially (violently) bad. He had never wanted to actually take them, out of fear of feeling both weak and dependent, but now? Now he took the bottle and shook out three - no, four - no nine sleeping pills.

After all, that drowning sensation was still right at bay and maybe, just maybe, these would help him swim to shore.

John quietly - too quietly, why was everything so bloody quiet?- walked out of his bedroom into the kitchen to find something to take the damned sleeping pills with. He grabbed a glass from the cupboard, resisting the urge to fill it with whiskey (in actuality he wanted an entire bottle. Why would he want to drown an entire bottle of whiskey at this late hour?), filled it with water, and swallowed all nine of the sleeping pills. And then he waited (for God only knew how long, it felt like moments - could have been hours). He waited and kept his head above water by thinking about that stupid quote about the sea. He waited, leaning against the kitchen counter until he began to feel the familiar pull of slumber tug at the back of his senses.

Ah finally. Much better. No more drowning tonight.

John turned on incredibly unsteady feet to head back to his room. Nine pills, why did he take nine? The rational doctor part of his brain immediately chastised him. Why did he take nine of those bloody pills? As John stumbled out of the kitchen, upon habit he looked down (after all, he didn't want to step on a dismembered body part again after last month's incident) and caught a glance of Sherlock's skull sitting on the kitchen counter, quietly nestled among the various unfinished experiments.

Sherlock's skull.

And then without any sort of warning, John was dragged violently underwater again, drowning faster and more painfully than ever before.

Oh God, no. John's brain was now reeling, grasping at the edges of memories that had been pushed back-something about a conversation he'd overheard earlier in the day (...was it Sherlock and..who else? Why?) Something about how he was supposed to be watching-some sort of magic trick, a magic trick that had come all too real-horribly real and wrong-right before his very eyes-

No, no, no.

Just make it stop, please make it-

_"Stay where you are John-"_

No. What were those words? His brain felt fuzzy and static through the haze of pain - John struggled to breathe, struggled to think.

_"Just do as I ask-"_

No, no, no.

Sherlock. Get Sherlock. His brain was clearly telling him that he had to find Sherlock.

Sherlock would know what to do, know what to say to him right now. If only he could hang on long enough to get to him. In an uncoordinated stupor, Dr. John Watson staggered over to Sherlock's bedroom and braced himself against the doorway. He tried to steady his breathing (he had to appear brave, right? He was brave). After what he considered several moments (right?) John pushed open the door as quietly as he could, hoping not to disturb his dear sleeping flatmate.

But...silence.

The room was completely, totally, and utterly empty.

Oh God.

Sherlock wasn't there and because of that, John Watson was dying. Drowning, actually. And he should know, he almost drowned when he was only a boy of seven years old. And - ah. The pain. And those words - those words? Those words-

_"Keep your-"_

NO.

John staggered forward to Sherlock's disheveled bed (that man had never actually made a bed in his life - he would never survive in the army), fighting the words that were suddenly pushing their way to the forefront of his brain. He was drowning now, he really was and he had been doing fine because he was always able to pull his head above water again but now, with these damned sleeping spills, he had now had forgotten, forgotten how to swim. And here he was, about to die in his best friend's unmade bed and-

And it was just so bloody silent.

And why did it just hurt.

So.

Damned.

Much?

Shaking, John crawled into Sherlock's bed pulled the covers around his body. He rested his head on the pillow and forced himself to steady his breathing. The pillow of a genius (his genius). It smelled just like Sherlock - aftershave and arrogance; brilliance with a touch of nicotine. John shut his eyes and fought the sensation of agony washing over him. Just focus on the pills (and that quote about the sea.) Those damned pills. He was so bloody tired. So damned tired. He was tired of swimming. Tired of fighting and for once John stopped fighting. The sleeping pills had finally worn away the last defensive strategies of the eternal soldier and he was just...tired. He forced himself to just lay there still for a moment...

...and imagined what the bed would be like with the genius slumbering next to him-

Alive.

He imagined Sherlock (his Sherlock) was alive.

John's breath hitched at the thought.

(And when he would look back at this night, he wouldn't remember anything besides thinking of that one word.)

Alive.

_"I'm a fake."_

What?

Oh God-no-no, no, no, no, no-

John couldn't breathe. Screaming underwater. Blackness. Silence. He was drowning. Literally dying. He was seven and drowning and dying and couldn't breathe and just wanted the pain-that inordinate indescribable pain-the pain of the human body succumbing and giving away-that pain-just make it-

Just.

Make.

It all.

Stop.

_"No one could be that clever."_

_"You could."_

No-oh God-NO.

Both his body and his mind screaming for that surrender to unconsciousness that the sleeping pills had promised, John was now frantically clinging to Sherlock's pillows-the blankets-anything-trying not to drown before the blackness overtook him. He was so close-so damned close-

_"Keep your eyes fixed on me."_

John was gasping for air now, inhaling everything-anything-Sherlock-please-

No no, no-NO.

Just make it stop.

He was clawing at the blankets now, and tears-why was he crying again? Had he ever even stopped?-tears were streaming down his face. And hyperventilating. That was new. And he was in pain-so much pain-he's seven and drowning again and he's seven and lost and dying. All he can see is blackness and darkness and-

"_Goodbye, John."_

Sherlock.

_Please._

And even though John Watson didn't fully believe in God, he found himself trying to whisper out loud to a God, trying to plead, trying to beg, trying to scream (is he making any sound at all? He can't tell.). He's praying and praying and praying to a God-

No, not any God.

His God.

(His bloody brilliant deliberate sea-eyed sociopathic God)

Pleasepleaseplease_._

Please, just...

Anything.

Anything to stop the drowning-


	2. Letters to the British Government

**Many thanks to my amazing beta thyla23! For those who care, I have this story on A03 now since I can't update it on FF.N from my ipad...hence updates on here will be less frequent, but since I started it on here I figured I may as well complete it on here too! :)**

* * *

_Denial ain't just a river in Egypt. –Mark Twain_

* * *

UNNAMED FLAT

WEST LONDON

15, MAY 2011

Last night, he dreamt he stood in a china shop so crowded from floor to far off ceiling with shelves of porcelain antiques that moving even a muscle would send some of them crashing down to bits. Exactly what happened, but instead of a crashing noise, each sound that should have been the sound of glass breaking was nothing more than eerie silence. He's had that dream every night now since the Fall and every night he prays and prays that he doesn't have it again. Although he would never admit it, the dream unnerves him somewhat. Is it foreshadowing or just a metaphor?

He can't decide.

He's spent the last week and a half in his pyjamas and dressing gown; there's really no point to getting dressed in real clothes anymore. For the last eleven days, he has sipped his coffee (five times a day, like clockwork) and idly twiddled with various objects around the tiny flat. He's read an inordinate amount of books (some good, most dull). A few days ago, he had even painted a yellow smiley face on the wall. He had frowned upon completion. Even with bullet holes in it, it didn't look like the one in 221B.

Tonight is the last night of his self-imposed incarceration. After the Event this evening (which he so unceremoniously is denied attendance due to the lack of expected turn out. The irony would have been riveting) he has been granted permission to roam about the city again, hiding in plain sight. For how long he will continue his ruse, he has not yet determined. Until its all fine again, he supposes.

It's late and it's raining. Dark outside. Sherlock lounges in his chair facing the window, bare feet resting against the windowsill, watching the raindrops barrage the glass panes. He's dressed in his loose fitting pyjamas, cup of coffee in hand (his fourth, need a fifth soon). The unnamed London street in front of him is wet and reflective from the rain. There is minimal traffic and so Sherlock watches the people stream on by, umbrellas raised, unknowing of the dead man, who now lives above and watches them, thinking. He looks on down, thinking about-how did he once put it? "The crushing tedium of boring people with their boring everyday grievances"? And inevitably with that, he thinks about the one thing, the one and only thing that saved him from his own crushing tedium of boring everyday grievances-

Stop it-stop thinking. It will be fine, it will all be fine someday. Stop thinking. Just be.

But Sherlock Holmes cannot just be. He restlessly taps his fingers together in unconscious concordance with the raindrops hitting the window. While doing so, to further distract himself, Sherlock looks over at the clock, hanging sadly upon the grey wall. All so grey, all so boring in this tiny little God-forsaken flat. 8:31pm. The Event is finally over (well, mostly over) and so Sherlock knows that now is the finally ideal time to do what he has been aching and aching to do for the few hours:

Contact.

The new mobile phone given to him eleven days ago utilizes advanced technology that does not yet exist outside of government testing facilities. In addition to being heavily encrypted, Sherlock's new mobile phone wipes its conversation memory once a text has been received and read. No record at all. There are several numbers programmed in the phone, but the one and only one that he can text right now has the exact same encryption and its conversation history wiped as well. A ghost of a phone for a ghost of a man. He had sworn up and down that it would strictly be used for emergencies only until after tomorrow. They had agreed before the Fall; he had_made_ Sherlock agree to lie as low as possible until after tonight's Event. It had been the one time in his life that Sherlock had actually acquiesced to his requests with minimal protestation. Since he did go to all of the trouble to fake his own death, he might as well follow through all the way, right?

Right.

Sherlock had already texted this other person earlier in the week and much to Sherlock's displeasure, no response. How predictable though. Boring. He knew that the other party had received the texts (he always receives the texts), and his lack of participation made Sherlock irritated, if only for a few moments. After irritated, Sherlock would go back about pacing the flat, turning on the telly, lying upside down on the couch with his feet on the wall, just anything to stop the thinking.

So what was the harm in texting this specific person again tonight? None, none at all. After tomorrow it wouldn't really matter any way. And so Sherlock Holmes reaches down from where he is still languishing, picks up the sleek phone currently resting on the windowsill and impulsively begins to text the one and only number he is allowed to text until tomorrow with the single word-

_Bored.-SH_

He smiles a perfunctory smile to himself (of course to himself, who else would be here?).

Regarding the person on the other side receiving that text, Sherlock believes that if he provokes him enough, tonight, of all the nights, he might just get a bite. Like fishing (had he ever been fishing? Maybe when they were boys, but clearly those memories had been deleted if they actually ever existed.) He knows that the Event should be mostly over by now and that that person on the receiving end will most likely be standing dryly in the corner, omnipotent and unemotional as always. The person who never texts when he can talk, but he can't talk now can he?

Three minutes go by and no response. He drums his fingers restlessly against the now blank screen. Sherlock knows the Event is mostly over-he _knows_-and is slightly irritated that out of sheer principle this other party won't text him back unless entirely necessary. He always did stand on a ridiculous amount of principle. However, unshaken in his resolve, Sherlock tries again.

_BORED_._-SH_

If the other party doesn't respond eventually, he might as well just go about texting Molly, or Mrs. Hudson for that matter, or even-

No. Stop thinking. Focus on something else instead. Just be.

Sherlock instinctively knows, he knows the exact question he has to ask in order to increase the propensity of getting the person on the receiving end to react. It's like fishing, really, right? He knows the question but instead, tonight of all nights, he wants to have a little fun first (and why not? With the Event, how deliciously ironic.) He wants to imagine the person on the receiving end who, normally so calm and unemotional, is now panicking silently at the frequency in which their secret phone is going off.

But texting wouldn't be any fun without subject matter. So, sipping his coffee, he first tries vague insults:

_You only sent me six books today and I've already read five before.-SH_

_Really, why on earth would you leave me with anything written by Chaucer?-SH_

_Bad move on your part.-SH_

_You've always had horrid taste in literature.-SH_

Five minutes go by without a response. Next, he tries being annoying:

_Bored.-SH_

_So, so bored.-SH_

_I. AM. BORED.-SH_

_Is this what having a real life is actually like? Being bored all the time?-SH_

_You did get my violin today, right? You did promise.-SH_

_If you'd been by to drop it off earlier, this wouldn't be happening.-SH_

_Do you mind if I light things on fire here? This flat is under your alias after all. -SH_

_BORED.-SH_

_Seriously, fire. Fetching the matches now.-SH_

Another three minutes go by and still no response. He knows at this point, the other party is most likely trying his hardest to ignore the constant buzzing in his pocket and continue on at The Event as diplomatically as possible. So next, Sherlock tries the one incident that he knows will elicit at least some response.

_If I hear that you told the story about when we went to Scotland for that summer holiday and encountered those...sheep, so help you.-SH_

He waits five minutes this time. But the fish is not biting, not snapping at any of the inflammatory and superfluous messages (Fair. He didn't earlier in the week, why would he now? Maybe he was counting too much on the effects of The Event) Finally, now starting to get bored again, Sherlock tries the approach that he knows (he_knows_), should elicit a response. With the person on the receiving end now primed and ready to go after Sherlock's barrage of texts, this should be relatively straightforward:

_How is my funeral? -SH_

Penny in the air. This time, barely thirty seconds pass by before the fish finally bites:

_Exhilarating.-M_

He can hear Mycroft's wry smile in the answer. Perhaps his brother has texted back out of mere frustration (probably), but he has broken the silence at last. However, Mycroft's next text is almost instantaneous and of a very different nature:

_Are you mad?-M_

Always a trickier question than it looks.

_I doubt it-SH_

Sherlock takes a sip of coffee as the next text vibrates through.

_We agreed that this would be for emergencies ONLY until after tomorrow; your new phone technically does not exist.-M_

Hah. Only Mycroft would use a semi-colon in a text. Sherlock can feel the first grin in over a week and a half slowly grow over his features as he types out his response. It's surprisingly painful, smiling again, and the thought of how much it hurts to smile suddenly makes him feel inexplicably sad.

_He_ always knew how to get Sherlock to smile. He _knew_. He didn't have to even do anything, anything at all, all he had to do was be himself. Just be-no, no. It's fine, it's fine. He was fine. It was all going to be fine.

Sherlock distracts himself by replying to his brother.

_It is an emergency. I'm dead. You should be worried.-SH_

The parry comes back a little too quickly. Mycroft is obviously irritated:

_And somehow, I'm not. -M_

Really Mycroft? You _arse_. Sherlock can imagine Mycroft, dressed in black on black, leaning against his umbrella, surreptitiously (and exasperatedly) texting his dead brother as he tried to fend off mourners and well-wishers who wanted to talk to the ostensible British Government. In his mind, he could see Mycroft sigh after sending that last text, slip his secret phone back into the pocket of his trousers, check his pocket watch, and give the next customary smile and nod to whoever wished to talk to him next. Mycroft was always so good at playing politics, but Sherlock didn't yet want their conversation to end.

And so before he even knows he's doing it (is he doing it now? Yes he is, how funny), Sherlock begins to instinctively deduce. It's like a case, only less complicated. He knows the victim and the perpetrator both all too well. Holmes against Holmes; and only one could win.

Deduction: His insulting/annoying/inflammatory attempts didn't work; Mycroft only responded when asking about the funeral, therefore he must be feeling slightly sentimental going through a superficial grief cycle (or something of that nature, isn't that what normal people do?). Or, he's hungry (probably that too), but for the sake of the argument, we'll go with sentiment.

Sentiment, brilliant.

Sentimentality was always his brother's weakness and so Sherlock plays upon that card. He puts on the disguise of the dead brother who after having a taste of his own mortality is now sad and alone and wondering if he's even made an impact on the world in which he had lived.

Not too far off, actually (but he'd never admit it.)

Sherlock pulls his knees to his chest and perches on the chair excitedly, much like he used to always do in 221B. It's a game now, finally a game and one that he can play after eleven days of virtual solitary confinement. He glances down at the mobile phone and then chooses his next words carefully to continue the facade that is not so much a facade. He wonders if Mycroft knows that he's lying (he deduces that he probably does. Mycroft always knows.)

_Are a lot of people there?-SH_

The answer comes faster than Sherlock would have expected. Maybe Mycroft is still irritated, or bored, or just simply tired of pretending to be sad. Maybe Mycroft misses him (Yes? No. No.) None the less, Mycroft is an actual participant in the conversation and that is all that matters to Sherlock at this instant.

_Lot of press earlier. Now, only the ones who matter are.-M_

The ones who matter? Let's see. Who was that? The ones who matter to Sherlock, he can count are on one hand: Mycroft, Mrs. Hudson, Lestrade, Molly, Mummy and-

A sharp intake of breath.

John.

And John.

John Watson. Dr. John Hamish Watson. After days of denial, it felt so good to think it, to feel it, to say it (is he saying it out loud now? He is.)

JohnandJohnandJohnandohGod, only John.

When he said he could the ones that matter on one hand, he really only meant John.

And there, he had said his name. And look, Sherlock was fine. Just fine. Absolutely fine living in a world without his best friend, his rock, and anchor. The man, who, in a perfect world, he would have wanted nothing more than to spend the rest of his life with. But the man, in this world, that for the very reasons of protecting him, he cannot. The man who he so drew in with his ultimate final act of the Fall—(Oh he didn't want to think about this now—he had been doing so well)-to make the stakes even higher and make the grief even more indelibly real. And it was tragic and real-the grief was real, it was so very real and so very raw for both of them. But it was worth it, it was so,_ so _worth it all to keep John alive. After all, Sherlock told himself time and time again (and time and time and _TIME_ again), a world with John Watson alive in it was a far more beautiful place than a world where he was dead. Right?

Right.

But for the moment, addictive personalities (his) breed addictive behaviours (smoking/deducing/faking his own death), and so, at the moment, instead of Sherlock being able to focus on something else-anything else-(and not the Fall. No more tonight.), all he can focus on now is one word, and that one word is John. The one word that currently means more to him than any other word on the face of the planet. With the self imposed limitations of denial now lifted, Sherlock suddenly wants to know more than anything in the world-no, not wants-_has_ to know more than anything in the world how John Watson (his John), is coping (or lack thereof.)

And so Sherlock obsessively begins to type the question he cannot ask into the text box of his mobile phone over and over and over again, each attempt sounding wrong.

_How is_-no. Delete. That's stupid.

_What is-_ No. Idiotic.

_Is he-_ Even more redundant.

Sherlock pauses, frustrated at himself as he grapples with the correct wording. He had always said that caring was a disadvantage and now if he didn't phrase it right, Mycroft could read the subtext and see exactly how deep the disadvantage actually ran. And it was deep. Unfathomably, inexplicably deep.

...because he didn't just care for John Watson, you see. No, he lov-

No. Don't say it (it hurts too much, for both of them.) Actually wait, yes, do say it. Just type it in and send it to Mycroft and be done with it. After all, as Mummy always said, an implausible truth can serve better than one plausible fiction.

However, the problem at present is that too much time has gone by between his texts. The problem is that Sherlock knows Mycroft too well and Mycroft will know what this pause in conversation inevitably means. And Sherlock knows that despite an inkling of sentimentality, Mycroft is still his brother, ever-taunting and ever-mocking and probably the one person who really knows how to play Sherlock for who he is. And so, after five minutes of staring numbly at his mobile phone and not quite finding the right words (would he ever find the right words?), Sherlock receives the much dreaded (and half way expected) verbal parry from his brother-

_Do you want to know what we found when we went to pick him up at your little flat today?-M_

Shit.

Sherlock doesn't respond.

He could count the times in his life when he didn't want to respond. The Woman's texts, yes. Those unnerved him and threw him off of his usual game. He had let the rest of society chalk it up to latent sexuality (which they really knew nothing of. Really, it should be so _obvious_ as to who he was keen for.) In actuality, Sherlock had felt nothing for The Woman, besides the fact that he disliked the feeling that someone could have actually been smarter than him. Someone could out manipulate the ultimate manipulator (really though, once all of this was over, he would have to try her no clothing tactic the next time he met an arch nemesis. _That_ was good.) During that time of uncertainty with The Woman, John, yes John, had been his touchstone-the one thing he could look to for steadfast support. John, the predictable jumpers, those understanding eyes, that knowing smile that lit up his entire face (and Sherlock's entire world), tea and coffee in on a rainy evening. During that time of uncertainty and instability and the questioning of his very foundation, in Sherlock's mind, John Watson had been home.

John Watson is his home.

And now Sherlock is aching, surprised at the amount of raw emptiness that thinking of John brings about. He sips his coffee and looks at his mobile phone, growing more numb by the second. The ache is dull and hollow and something that he has been forcing himself not to think about for the entire week and a half, but he's thinking about it now and it _hurts_.

Another full five minutes pass by before Mycroft's next text arrives. Sherlock doesn't even realize he has been staring at a completely blank screen until it lights up with another message from his brother.

_You really don't want to know?-M_

This was not the way that this conversation was supposed to go. It was supposed to be him playing Mycroft, not the other way around. Another text-

_So talkative and now so silent. -M _

Mycroft, always turning the tables. Sherlock should have seen it coming, but as usual, he always misses something.

_For curiosity's sake, I've attached a picture.-M_

Sherlock pulls his knees up on the chair, defensively now, curling into a ball as he watches the screen wipe itself clean. He hears the distinctive beep of a received picture message but instead of checking it, he sets down the mobile phone on the windowsill and turns it over. If he can't see whatever Mycroft sent him, it doesn't exist (kind of like, if he doesn't think about John, he won't realize how insurmountably empty his life is right now.)

Besides, he was out of coffee anyway.

No more time for texting, instead it was time for another cup of coffee, his fifth and final for the day. Sherlock stretches in his chair (and checks outside, still raining? _Good_. Dramatic!) He stands up and makes his way to the kitchen, trying his best to ignore the phone sitting on the windowsill. However, Mycroft knows this and knows his brother's ultimate weakness is curiosity and so the phone vibrates again as Mycroft resends the picture.

And again.

And again.

And again.

And again. And again. And again. Sherlock is in the kitchen now, pouring himself his fifth and final cup of coffee for the day and he can hear the damned phone vibrating against the plaster on the windowsill. Mycroft has turned the tables and is sending him the damned picture over and over again until he knows that Sherlock can't take it anymore (and he can't, he really can't.) It was only fair, really. He did provoke Mycroft earlier with the same behaviour, right?

And so, Sherlock returns from the kitchen, and settles back down into his chair, pulls his knees close and takes a sip of fresh coffee. He listens to the rain for a moment and stares as the phone, now ominously full of pictures.

Damn you, Mycroft.

Sighing with resignation, Sherlock reaches one arm down and turns his mobile phone over. He scrunches his brow and mentally braces himself for the worst before clicking on the image. However, instead of a picture of something like Sherlock had expected, like John dead, John disheveled and haunted, John looking like more of a ghost than the actual dead man himself, the picture is somewhat more confusing. Sherlock's eyes narrow unconsciously as he looks at the mobile phone screen. It is a picture of their living room at 221B Baker (really Mycroft, what _are_ you playing at?) Structurally, it looks exactly the same, nothing has been moved around or taken out of place. The smiley face, John's desk, the Union Jack pillow, his chair, their skull portrait, their couch. Check, check and check. Nothing has been changed (right? Right.) Predictable, the usual.

_Really_, Mycroft, what-

-and then Sherlock's eyes open wide as he observes _what_ exactly is covering floor, the coffee table, the desk, and the chairs, and almost every available surface in their living room at 221 B Baker-

Coffee cups, approximately 50-55.

They are of varying types, colours, shapes, and sizes. A few Sherlock recognized are his own from the kitchen (he should have asked Mycroft to retrieve that Loch Ness one, he rather liked it), some are from the cafe down Baker street several blocks where he and John tended to frequent on weekends and/or lazy rainy mornings. Several are brown paper cups that he doesn't recognize maybe from the north side of town (why would John be going up there? Oh wait, Harry lived up there, didn't she?) However it doesn't matter where they're from, because upon all of the paper cups, scrawled in black marker on the sides, always different handwriting, are different variations of his name. Some correct, some incorrect, but it's always there. His name written almost 55 times by various baristas: "Sherlock", "sherlock", "Sherlok", "Sure-lock", "Sherlock."

55 coffee cups, 5 X 11, five times a day every day since he had died.

Mycroft's next two texts follow before Sherlock can register the unfathomable emptiness that the image so strongly evoked (caring was a disadvantage, it was a disadvantage because it _hurt_ so damned much.)

_In case you can't use your usual skills of deduction from afar, brother, John Watson has brought you your coffee five times a day over the last week and a half. -M_

_Does that answer the question that you can't bring yourself to ask?-M_

Yes. Quite.

Another text? What was Mycroft _doing_? Shouldn't he be busy mourning right now?

However, this one makes Sherlock smile:

_And now Mummy says I look like an insensitive idiot texting at my dear brother's funeral. Will meet with you tomorrow, as planned.-M _

Despite the fact he feels like he's hollow inside, Sherlock can't resist having that last final word.

_Any more than three pieces of cake tonight and they'll know I'm alive. -SH_

Oh, good. That one was good. Sherlock smiles to himself and keeps smiling until approximately thirty three seconds later when he receives the unexpected reply:

_There's no cake at your funeral, Sherlock-M_

His eyes narrow after reading Mycroft's final words. No cake? How criminal. He would have thought that every funeral should have cake. Especially his funeral (his fake funeral.) If John Watson had organized his fake funeral as opposed to Mycroft, he would have had cake there because he would have known, he would have _known_ that seeing Mycroft struggle not to eat it all throughout the night would have made Sherlock laugh, which would have made John laugh. And hearing John Watson laugh was perhaps the greatest sound in Sherlock's world, ever.

But Sherlock would never hear that laugh again.

Or would he? He would, right. One day he would, right? It would all be fine one day, somehow and they would be reunited and everything would be back to normal. Just he and John Watson and 221B Baker and everything beautiful and perfect just the way it had been (since he had met John.)

But for now...

For now he has to be fine with things the way they are. Right? He has to be fine with it all. And as much as Sherlock wants nothing more than to go to 221B Baker tonight, throw his arms around John, to hold him and cry with him and tell him (_tell_ him!) how he is actually alive and how it's all going to be fine because they're together-

He can't.

And Sherlock is fine, just fine (or so he tells himself. He tells himself over and over and _OVER_ again just as he has for the last eleven days; the last eleven days while John Watson has been bringing him coffee and pretending that he's fine, just fine, as well.)

Sherlock looks at the clock. 9:36pm. The Event is over, finally. He sets his now empty cup of coffee back down on the windowsill, stretches, and finally flops from his chair to the couch. Sherlock curls up in a ball on the couch, legs tucked to his chest and prays for sleep to come early. He does so because he truly believes a world with John Watson alive in it is a far better place than a world without John Watson at all (_absolutely_. He believes in that more than he's ever believed in anything before.)

But John Watson is still bringing him coffee and Sherlock Holmes is still pretending that he can survive in a world without him.

That night, he dreams of the china shop again so crowded from floor to far off ceiling, but this time, his movements bring not some but all of the porcelain figures crashing down. Exactly what happened, but tonight, each sound that should be the sound of glass breaking is only the sound of his name-

John and John and John and John.


End file.
